Ah, the wonders of summer. (Sorry, but when it’s 90+ degrees out for days on end, it’s summer already!) With summer comes zucchini. And with zucchini comes lots of …
You guessed it! Zucchini bread.
This recipe uses soaked, freshly milled whole wheat flour, yogurt, eggs from pastured hens, and locally-raised raw honey. It’s not a dessert bread by any means. It’s both mildly sour and sweet, with enough cinnamon to make your house smell like heaven.
Why soak the flour?
Grains are notoriously hard for our bodies to digest. Think of it this way: They are essentially the seeds of various forms of grass (yes rye, wheat, oats, corn, etc. are all grasses). The only animals designed to eat grasses are ruminants (like cows). We don’t have four stomachs. So, we’ve got to “pre-digest” grains by preparing them according to traditional methods if we’re going to actually get all the vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients out of them as we possibly can without wreaking untold havoc on our digestive system in the meantime.
Or, you can look at this way: As seeds, the grain’s goal is to reproduce, to sprout, to turn into a new plant. So, they are on the defensive. They do everything in their power to preserve the seed and to make it unpalatable for us to consume. As such, the seeds contain an anti-nutrient called phytic acid which binds to minerals like calcium and zinc as well as vitamins like niacin in our guts and prevents our bodies from absorbing those valuable nutrients. They’re also acid-forming in the gut, and their high-carb properties make them the ideal food for all the bad yeast, viruses, and parasites living in our intestines.
Because of all this, many people (including myself) opt to avoid grains. They’re a lot of work! But sometimes, you want to eat grains. They’re cheap. They’re tasty. And if you eat them with a lot of fat (like delicious yellow butter from grass-fed cows), you’re not going to have the extreme insulin response you’d expect from all those carbs.
To overcome the barriers presented by grains, you can give the grain what it wants by sprouting it (in this way, your body digests the grain like a vegetable and not like a seed) or you can do the work of a ruminant’s stomach and soak the freshly milled flour in an acidic medium to help break down the phytic acid and “pre-digest” the grain.
The Players
- 3 C. freshly ground whole wheat flour
- 2 C. yogurt
- 2 C. grated zucchini
- 1 tsp. sea salt
- 3 eggs (from pastured hens )
- 1/4 C. melted coconut oil
- 1/4 C. honey
- 3 tsp. cinnamon
- 3 tsp. vanilla
- 2 tsp. baking soda
The How-To:
Begin with your freshly milled whole wheat flour.
Add in your yogurt and stir until a batter forms.
Cover with a plate and let sit for 12-24 hours. The longer you let it sit, the more developed the flavor will become. Plus, the longer you let it set, the more digestible the grain will become.
About an hour before you’re ready to put the bread in the oven, grate your zucchini, sprinkle it with the salt, and let it sit for an hour.
After an hour, you’ll notice a significant amount of water collecting in the bottom of your bowl. Drain the water, then pat your zucchini dry using a white towel.
Add the zucchini, eggs, coconut oil, honey, cinnamon, vanilla, and baking soda to your mixing bowl and mix until evenly distributed.
Pour the batter into an oiled & floured 9X4 baking pan.
Bake at 350F for 1.5 hours or until a knife stuck in the middle comes out clean. Remove from pan and let cool completely before slicing, toasting, and serving with a healthy dollop of butter from grass-fed cows. YUM!
Liked what you read? You may find these other posts interesting:
- Authentic Whole Grain Buttermilk Pancakes
- Why use buttermilk?
- Free Copy of “Cooking With Coconut Flour”
Ah, the wonders of summer. (Sorry, but when it’s 90+ degrees out for days on end, it’s summer already!) With summer comes zucchini. And with zucchini comes lots of …
You guessed it! Zucchini bread.
This recipe uses soaked, freshly milled whole wheat flour, yogurt, eggs from pastured hens, and locally-raised raw honey. It’s not a dessert bread by any means. It’s both mildly sour and sweet, with enough cinnamon to make your house smell like heaven.
Why soak the flour?
Grains are notoriously hard for our bodies to digest. Think of it this way: They are essentially the seeds of various forms of grass (yes rye, wheat, oats, corn, etc. are all grasses). The only animals designed to eat grasses are ruminants (like cows). We don’t have four stomachs. So, we’ve got to “pre-digest” grains by preparing them according to traditional methods if we’re going to actually get all the vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients out of them as we possibly can without wreaking untold havoc on our digestive system in the meantime.
Or, you can look at this way: As seeds, the grain’s goal is to reproduce, to sprout, to turn into a new plant. So, they are on the defensive. They do everything in their power to preserve the seed and to make it unpalatable for us to consume. As such, the seeds contain an anti-nutrient called phytic acid which binds to minerals like calcium and zinc as well as vitamins like niacin in our guts and prevents our bodies from absorbing those valuable nutrients. They’re also acid-forming in the gut, and their high-carb properties make them the ideal food for all the bad yeast, viruses, and parasites living in our intestines.
Because of all this, many people (including myself) opt to avoid grains. They’re a lot of work! But sometimes, you want to eat grains. They’re cheap. They’re tasty. And if you eat them with a lot of fat (like delicious yellow butter from grass-fed cows), you’re not going to have the extreme insulin response you’d expect from all those carbs.
To overcome the barriers presented by grains, you can give the grain what it wants by sprouting it (in this way, your body digests the grain like a vegetable and not like a seed) or you can do the work of a ruminant’s stomach and soak the freshly milled flour in an acidic medium to help break down the phytic acid and “pre-digest” the grain.
The Players
The How-To:
Begin with your freshly milled whole wheat flour.
Add in your yogurt and stir until a batter forms.
Cover with a plate and let sit for 12-24 hours. The longer you let it sit, the more developed the flavor will become. Plus, the longer you let it set, the more digestible the grain will become.
About an hour before you’re ready to put the bread in the oven, grate your zucchini, sprinkle it with the salt, and let it sit for an hour.
After an hour, you’ll notice a significant amount of water collecting in the bottom of your bowl. Drain the water, then pat your zucchini dry using a white towel.
Add the zucchini, eggs, coconut oil, honey, cinnamon, vanilla, and baking soda to your mixing bowl and mix until evenly distributed.
Pour the batter into an oiled & floured 9X4 baking pan.
Bake at 350F for 1.5 hours or until a knife stuck in the middle comes out clean. Remove from pan and let cool completely before slicing, toasting, and serving with a healthy dollop of butter from grass-fed cows. YUM!
Liked what you read? You may find these other posts interesting: